Walled garden, gate piers and attached gardeners' stores to the south of Bloxholm Hall, Ashby de la Launde and Bloxholm, Lincolnshire

Summary

An early-C19 walled garden and gate piers with attached gardeners' stores.

The easternmost store and boiler house to the north of the walls are not included in the listing. *Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that the easternmost store and boiler house to the north of the walls are not of special architectural or historic interest.

Description

An early-C19 walled garden and gate piers with attached gardeners' stores.

MATERIALS: the walls and outbuildings are constructed of brick with stone dressings and some areas of stucco render. Gates are wrought iron.

PLAN: the walls are constructed with the principal southern entrance to Bloxholm Hall on the south elevation. This leads to a walled garden with a curved north wall to follow the former bowling green beyond. A separate walled kitchen garden is located to the west and is open at its south end. On the north elevation of the north walls of this kitchen garden are lean-to gardeners’ stores.

DESCRIPTION: the walls are tall and constructed in brick in a variety of bonds topped with moulded stone copings. The principal gates are located on the south elevation and have tall brick piers with stone surround and moulded coping stone. On the west elevations of the west pier is surviving scrolling stone ornamentation. Within the piers are some sections of C20 brick infill and C20 iron gates. The west-east section of walls runs for approximately 95m before turning north to continue for a further 90m. Two modern stores are located on the interior of the east wall and are not included in the listing.

The north wall is curved and accommodates a former bowling green to the north. Further gates are located at the centre of this wall, continuing to Bloxholm Hall to the north, and match those on the garden’s entrance with stone surround and scrolling details to the piers. A further gate is located at the north-west corner of this garden with the walls sweeping up to meet ashlar stone piers with a moulded cornice and square coping stone. Further to the north, piers for the former orangery contained within the perimeter wall are brick covered with stucco render. Facing these gates, leading to the walled kitchen garden, is a further stone pier, with any corresponding gate now lost.

The walled kitchen garden has an entrance on its north, west and east walls with timber boarded door and moulded stone architrave. The walls have regularly spaced shallow brick buttresses. The location of a former glasshouse is visible on the north wall with the walls rising in height to accommodate the building. A brick chimney within the wall indicates that the glasshouse was heated.

On the north side of the wall are a series of former stores and a former boiler house. At the east end of the wall are two attached lean-to buildings with the easternmost building understood to have formerly contained a boiler. Both of these buildings have been rebuilt and altered in the early-C21 and are not included in the listing*. To the west, on the north side of the glasshouse, is a further lean-to store building which has a tiled timber roof structure supported by curved brick piers. Between the outbuildings, roughly at the centre of the wall, are the remains of a further small brick lean-to building with brick drop arch (infilled). The building has no roof but has a further, partially infilled opening on its west elevation.

* Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that the easternmost store and boiler house to the north of the walls are not of special architectural or historic interest, however any works which have the potential to affect the character of the listed building as a building of special architectural or historic interest may still require Listed Building Consent and this is a matter for the Local Planning Authority to determine.

History

Bloxholm walled garden is understood to have been constructed in the early-C19 and was erected as part of the Bloxholm estate with Bloxholm Hall (Grade II) located approximately 200m to the north. Between 1825 and 1827 it is recorded that the Manners family of Bloxholm Hall ‘enlarged and beautified’ both the house and gardens. As part of the alterations a stable block was erected to the north of the house (Grade II) and an estate cottage was constructed to the south (Grade II). Trees were also planted and a new formal southern approach to the house was laid. It is likely that the walled garden was designed and constructed as part of these alterations. The walls are thought to be laid as a depiction of the Egyptian seated figure of Isis with the south-west corner of the walls and surrounding planting illustrating Isis’ foot.

The first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1888 depicts the walls with a number of detached glasshouses within the west, working section of the garden, near to the north-south dividing wall. A further two rectangular glasshouses and a square orangery are depicted on the south elevation of the north kitchen garden wall. Two gardeners’ stores are depicted on the north side of the wall with a further L-shaped building at the very north-east of the walls. By the 1905 map, one of the detached glasshouses had been rebuilt in brick as a further store. By 1979 this store had been converted into a dwelling known as The Cottage (later Willows End), with a further dwelling known as The Hall Gardens created from the L-shaped building at the north-east end of the garden. Both dwellings have been altered in the late-C20 and are not included in the listing. All of the glasshouses within the gardens had been demolished by 1979 with an outbuilding shown on the partial footprint of the former orangery. By the late-C20 some of the lean-to gardeners’ stores to the north of the walls had become ruinous and in the early-C21 a series of efforts to rebuild the easternmost store and boiler house were undertaken. These buildings are not included in the listing.

Reasons for Listing

Bloxholm Walled Garden, constructed in the early-C19, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural Interest:

* the walls have an unusual plan with curving north wall and were clearly intended a statement to impress visitors, forming part of an early-C19 southern approach to Bloxholm Hall to the north;
* the walls have architectural quality with smart stone dressings and decorative stone ornamentation including scrolling elements, ashlar piers and moulded coping.

Historic Interest:

* the walls pre-date the proliferation of detached walled gardens in the mid-C19 and are therefore a relatively early survival;
* the walls survive with a number of other contemporary structures linked to the C18 Bloxholm estate, demonstrating its expansion into the C19.

External Links

Historic England Listing

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